Our driving force

Hop in—let’s go! Join us for an interactive car meet where car culture and performing arts come together in a shared exploration of car bodies, choreography, and the rumble of engines.
“Vår Drivkraft” features performance elements like music and theater mixed with car rides for experiences along the way and transportation to new secret destinations.
When the final ride is complete, we’ll gather and wrap up the evening together. Experience a living cultural center on wheels where you’ll encounter cultural experiences and local car enthusiasts in a wonderful collaboration.

READ THE PRESS RELEASE from May 28 >>

“Our Driving Force” is an innovative performance in which we transform a local parking lot (Bonnstan, since we’re performing in Skellefteå) into the hub of a mobile cultural center. Together with the actors, dancers, and technicians from Västerbottensteatern—as well as local car enthusiasts—we create an evening full of unexpected encounters.

No two trips are alike, and you never really know what awaits around the next corner. This is intimate, simple, in the moment, and a little adventurous.

So what actually happens? We meet at the venue and the show begins. At specific times, you’ll be invited into one of the cars—you can choose whether you want to go or not, and if you’d like to ride with a specific friend. Someone starts the engine. Maybe an actor is behind the wheel and launches into a monologue. Maybe you’ll get to go on a personal tour to someone’s favorite spot in the city. Maybe the car stops—and you step right into a small music concert. Between the car rides, we meet again at the performance venue, only to be invited a little while later to a new car ride with a secret destination.

No two tours are alike, and you never quite know what awaits around the next bend. This experience is intimate, simple, in the moment, and a bit adventurous. Since we partner with local car clubs, both the cars and drivers can vary from night to night, making every tour completely unique. When all the tours are done, we gather again, chat, come back down to earth—and wrap up the evening together.

Vår Drivkraft is for those who love culture and cars—or just want to try something different. Come as you are. Buckle up. And come along.

Facts about the games in Skellefteå:
– Norrland Motor Historians – Skellefteå Chapter helps create the show and provides cars and drivers.

– The gathering area is the large green space in Bonnstan in front of the stage.

– Refreshments will be available at the meeting place.

Background to the performance:

Our Driving Forceis an evening-long event where you, together with the actors, technicians, dancers, and car enthusiasts of the Västerbotten Theater, explore the intersection of two seemingly distinct worlds: the performing arts and car culture. In a parking lot, the cars are transformed into a living cultural center on wheels, where each car offers a unique gateway to our shared “tinkering” with culture.

The idea for the production came from Tove Berglund—director, set designer, costume designer, and artistic director ofOscenin Jämtland.

– In the village of Håkansta, where I live in Jämtland, I’ve begun to understand the significance of car culture. Here, in the countryside, cars are more than just vehicles. They are workplaces, hobbies, and important gathering places where Eporna cars become youth centers on wheels, taking drivers from childhood into adulthood. In this way, you can understand car culture as the folk culture of our time, where cars are the campfires that bring people together around stories and shared experiences.

Based on this insight, the idea emerged for a performance that invites audiences into a unique cultural center on wheels, blending the popular culture of the streets with the artistic expressions of established cultural institutions. This is a type of performance space that Tove frequently explores—often in collaboration with her partner, choreographer Ludvig Daae. Together, they created, among other things, the interactive trailer parkMeningen med livet(The Meaning of Life), which was produced by Norrlandsoperan and toured with Dansnät Sverige in 2024. InVår drivkraft(Our Driving Force), they take this form further into new performing arts experiences far beyond the (black) box.

When Tove and Ludvig approached the Västerbotten Theater with their idea, the theater’s artistic director, Johanna Salander, was immediately on board.

– I want our performing arts to reach beyond the usual venues to new places in the county, outside the traditional stages, and for them to be unique and exclusive to the audiences who get to experience them. Our Drivkraft is exactly that kind of project—unexpected encounters and completely unique experiences that might take place in your neighbor’s garage or in the parking lot at the grocery store. Tove and Ludvig are experts at creating cool meeting places where you can experience art in a way you’ve never encountered it before. This is exactly the kind of unexpected and explosive performance that I love. Talk about something different! Something people will be talking about long after it’s over, says Johanna.

About the performance *
* The performance takes place in a parking lot where the audience gathers around a choreographed piece before splitting up and being driven off in different cars. During each car ride, the audience is treated to a cultural experience—a mini-performance where the journey itself can be the destination. The “mini-performance” can take place during the drive through the city, such as a guided tour of the driver’s hometown or a monologue by an actor. But it could also be that the journey heads toward a specific location where the audience leaves the car for a short while to enjoy a brief musical performance before being driven back to the pickup point to hop into a new car and have another experience. When the final ride is complete, everyone gathers again in the parking lot and the evening concludes together.